


whatever we are made of

by dejame



Category: Druck | SKAM (Germany)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-18
Updated: 2019-04-18
Packaged: 2020-01-15 19:55:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18505966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dejame/pseuds/dejame
Summary: enemies to friends to lovers davenzi ficFollow David through his indifference, hate, curiosity, friendship, infatuation, and love with and toward one Matteo Florenzi.





	1. Indifference to Hate

“I don't hate Matteo,” David says, but he sounds defensive about it. Leonie and Sara exchange a knowing glance. “I don't hate anybody.”

“So you just severely dislike him, then?” Leonie has this condescending smile that, David knows, is supposed to encourage laughter but it only ever frustrates him. He doesn't like being so seen. Leonie notices everything about him every day, and she points it out every time. It's infuriating.

“No, I just,” David sighs. “There's just no active reason to like him. He knew your boyfriend was cheating on you and did nothing.” Then, to Sara, “And he's mean to you.”

“He's not mean,” Sara says quickly. “He's just going through a lot with his mom.”

“No, I'm on David's side with this one.” Leonie leans back on her elbows and stretches her neck. Around them, their classmates slowly spill out of the locker rooms while dressed in their gym clothes. " _You're_ going through a lot with _your_ mom and you aren't a jerk to him.”

“You guys are being too critical.” Sara huffs and her pale cheeks blush pink. “He really cares about me. He does. And that's hard. Because we've got Abi and family and friends, too, and sometimes it doesn't all work out. But he's trying. That's what we should judge him on. That he's trying.”

* * *

Matteo Florenzi is not trying.

When David arrives at the apartment, he smells the weed before he sees anyone's face. A song is playing, something strange-sounding and English. When Matteo answers the door, he says, “Hans is trying to impress some guy he met in Alex.” And also, “He's gay,” by way of explanation.

Not a great start. David hopes his face is neutral.

“Are you ready to study?”

“Yeah, yeah, come in.”

His apartment looks like shit. It has a sort of manic, hectic energy: the blasts of music, the scent of weed, the feel of stickiness to the air. There's a bra hanging in the kitchen. Matteo notices David staring at it and goes, defensively, “It's clean.”

David nods like,  _Of course it is. Why else would I be balking at a bra over your kitchen sink?_

Matteo either doesn't understand the sarcasm or chooses to ignore it.

* * *

“So, he's homophobic,” David says. Leonie shakes her head. “No, he is. He was being rude about his roommate.”

“There's no way Matteo is homophobic. Jonas would've dropped him years ago.”

“Why?” David asks. “Is Jonas gay?”

Leonie shrugs. “Probably.” And then she smiles. “Why? Are you interested?” She backs into her bedroom wall and eyes him, expectant. She has pretty eyes. Big and batty and flirty. She presses into the wall and he presses into her. She lifts her chin and raises an eyebrow. “Everybody wants my seconds…”

He laughs. Jokingly: “Shut up.” And they spend the next hour kissing. Small pecks, here and there, between the pages of abandoned textbooks and commercials of cable television.

* * *

“You want a joint?” Matteo keeps at least one blunt on him at all times. Now, it's pressed firmly behind his right ear lobe, and the way it pushes his hair back makes it look more like an accessory than a drug. David realizes now that Matteo is kinda hot. He doesn't think that's fair.

“I want to help you study,” David says.

“No, you don't.” Matteo leans back in his seat. “I know you're only here because Sara asked you. It's fine; I don't care.” David stares. “You okay?”

“I don't like smoking,” he says.

“Okay. Just thought I'd ask.”

“Right, you were being polite.”

“Yeah…?” Matteo’s eyebrows cinch together in confusion. David sighs.

“If you were really being polite, don't you think you would've asked if I was okay with smoking before you did it in front of me? What if I had asthma or a sensitivity to it?”

“So,” Matteo says after a long pause. “You don't like me because I didn't ask if you had asthma?”

David’s hands squeeze into fists. “Why does everyone think I don't like you? When did I ever say that? We're fine!” He explodes. “And even if I didn’t like you—who cares? We don't _have_ to like one another, do we? Just because our girlfriends are friends doesn't mean we have to be.”

As David speaks, Matteo removes the joint from behind his ear, fumbles through his pockets for a lighter, and lights up. He sucks in a hit, holds it, waits for David to finish (which is actually quite polite of him, David thinks), and exhales.

Matteo says, “Well, I don't like you.” And when David doesn’t respond, he says, “You're so secretive. Always hiding. There's no need to be so mysterious.”

David says, “You dress like my grandfather.”

And Matteo says, “You've worn the same hoodie for 3 weeks.”

“Your taste in music _sucks_.”

“You think you're too good for me.”

“You're homophobic.”

“Homophobic?” He leans forward, a smile forming on his lips. “I'm not homophobic. Jonas would've dropped me years ago.”

“So I'm told.”

“You talk about me?” David begins gathering his things.

“No,” he says. He forcefully shoves his textbook into his bag. Matteo offers him the joint again. David glares down at it until he moves it away. “And I don't think I'm better than you. I don't think of you at all.”

* * *

Unfortunately, he thinks of Matteo many times after this.

This is his favorite hoodie. He looks _great_ in black. Fuck him.

* * *

Okay, so he hates Matteo. Whatever. Like, literally why does it even matter? Who cares?

* * *

Everyone cares.

We're getting ice cream after class, David, but Matteo will be there. Is that okay?

David, Carlos might bring Matteo to study tonight; is that a problem?

The party tonight is at Matteo’s place. Are you still coming, David?

“Yes!” David yells. Students at a few tables nearby send worried glances their way. Sara blushes and fiddles with her fingers. He says, “Sorry.”

Leonie’s like, “You're so sensitive when it comes to Matteo.” _Oh, really?_ he thinks. _I hadn't noticed._ And then she goes, “Babe, your eye is twitching.”

* * *

Matteo is good for parties, at the very least. The lights and the apartment and the cool roommates and all of that. The music still sucks, though.

Sara drinks like it's the end of the world, and when Matteo tries to cut her off, she pushes him away. After one attempt, Matteo moves on, chatting with the boys along the wall. David rolls his eyes and sets his own drink down. He takes Sara’s bottle.

“No!” she laughs and snatches it back.

“This won't make you feel better.”

“But I do feel better.” Well, it’s hard to argue with that.

Instead of leaving her, though, he tracks her throughout the night to make sure she's safe. Leonie joins him, then shakes her head.

“Matteo’s not helping at all tonight, huh?” she asks. David shakes his head. David sips his beer. “I have to take her home. Make sure her parents don't find out. Can you tell him we're leaving?” And because she knows he'll refuse, she walks away as soon as she finishes asking the question. David rolls his eyes, finishes his beer, and moves through the crowd.

He finds Matteo on the dance floor. With a boy.

There are many things wrong with what David is seeing. First, this should be considered cheating. Sure, they aren't making out, but it's obvious from the way the boy looks at Matteo that he wants something romantic, something sexual.

Also, he wasn't aware Matteo liked boys. Does he like boys? Is he just straight and clueless, just dancing with a friend? Or is he interested in boys? Suddenly, this is pertinent information. David would like to know.

Finally, and most importantly, Matteo now exists on a sexual spectrum. Before, he was just that guy who smelled like hash. Then, Sara’s boyfriend. (Though David would be lying to himself if he said he'd never noticed how pink Matteo’s lips were when they kissed, or how Matteo’s hands would come up and wrap around her, or how his hair fell into his face. How he would allow his head to drop back and let Sara kiss at his neck while his lazy eyes traveled around the room and, more often than not, settled on him.) It is one thing to objectively acknowledge Matteo is cute. That exists on the same plane as assuming he's straight. It prevents any emotion from forming, institutionally, by blocking your brain from going any further. It eliminates Matteo as an option, as anything worth thinking about.

Matteo is not romance. He is not sex. He is not subjective. He is your nice friend’s annoying boyfriend. You barely care about him.

Matteo dancing with a boy somehow disqualifies all of that.

The boy grabs Matteo’s face, pulls him forward, and kisses him. It's awkward and awful and abhorrent. Matteo pushes him away and moves further into the crowd, disappearing in the people.


	2. Curiosity to Friendship

Matteo is not okay. His door is locked, his room is silent, and David can smell the weed seeping out into the hallway. And now, when David thinks back on it, that was rather rude. To grab someone and force them to love you. To assault someone in a crowd where the energy is too hectic for anyone to call you out, for anyone to even notice. What a sad, sad thing David has witnessed. What a sad boy Matteo seems to be.

The cops come to dismantle the party. David hides in the bathroom.

When everyone is gone, he returns to Matteo’s door. He knocks. No answer.

“Matteo?” Nothing. “Um, I saw what happened. If you want to talk about it…” Apparently, he does not.

He will not leave because he shouldn't. However, he also shouldn't overstay his welcome. His mother had always advised him to leave a place cleaner than when he found it. His mother was seldom correct about most things, but perhaps she'd been right about this.

He starts with the hall: sweeping, picking up bottles, removing the smell. They do not have air freshener; they have poo-pourri. David sighs, wrinkles his nose, and sprays.

The living room is a mess: solo cups, clothes, and confetti. David cleans this methodically, step by step, his hands seeming to move of their own accord. He shuffles through music on his phone, good music from better artists on the best albums. He likes this.

And now he must reconcile this in his mind: that he's learning something new about himself because of a boy he dislikes and that he's done so by remembering the proverb of a woman who dislikes him.

He didn't know there was more of himself to discover. And he'd assumed that if there was, he would discover it himself and on his own.

“You're still here?” David awkwardly stands tall and lets the trash in his hands hang by his sides. Matteo narrows his eyes. “Are you _cleaning_ my _apartment_?”

“I was being nice.”

Matteo smiles. “Right, you're polite. I forgot.” They both seem to notice the blunt in his hand at the same time. Matteo goes, “I can put it out.” David feels his cheeks turning red. _So fucking presumptuous_.

“You know, you can do more with weed than just smoke it.” At this, Matteo raises his eyebrows.

* * *

They make two double-wide pans of brownies.

After one bite, Matteo professes that he “can see God.”

* * *

“You didn't have to clean up,” Matteo says. He leans back on the couch now, lounging. David sinks to the floor, running his hands up and down the soft carpet. “Could've just knocked on my door.”

“I did; you didn't answer.”

“I was listening to music.” And at the same time, they say, “Shitty music.” David takes another brownie from the pan.

He says, “I thought you wanted to be alone.”

Matteo says, instantly, “I never want to be alone.” David turns to look at him.

While chewing, he goes, “But you're always alone.” Matteo shrugs. “You should work on that.”

Matteo laughs. “Thanks for the advice.” His hand flounders around on the floor, searching. David nudges the pan into his reach. Matteo grabs it, then frowns. “Dude, you took the last one.” David giggles.

He watches as Matteo lifts the pan to his face anyways. He sees Matteo stick out his tongue and lap at the crumbs inside. He tracks the pink as it flexes and dips and moves across aluminum.

David, genuinely and accidentally out loud: “Jesus. Fucking. Christ.” Matteo finishes, satisfied, and falls back onto the couch. David squeezes his eyes closed.

* * *

Now that he definitely knows the way a person should not be kissed nor should be touched, David tries his best to incorporate this into his relationship. The next time he kisses Leonie, it is slow and purposeful and deep. He drags his hands up her waist, over her shoulders, and into her hair and she says, “Hurry up.”

“Huh?”

“Just kiss me. Kiss me.”

He’s like, “I am kissing you.” Leonie lies on her bed and grabs at him. He backs away. “What are you doing?”

“What are _you_ doing?” She moves for him again. Again, he backs away. “What is it?”

“Can’t we go slower?”

“Why?”

“Because I want to.”

She huffs. “David, I’m literally dying.”

He doesn’t understand what he’s doing wrong.

* * *

Kissing should mean something. Every single touch and look should signal an emotion or thought, he thinks. And you should feel it in every bone, all the way from your head to your toes, and patiently ask for another and another again, if you want to.

David never thought about love before. He never really thought he’d have to. He thought about having fun and hooking up and kissing pretty people. He thought about Leonie and her smile and her condescending smirks. And how she always smelt like lavender and made a cute giggle every time he kissed a specific spot on her neck. He never thought about loving her, though.

Matteo makes him think about love. Or, rather, Matteo makes him think about Love, capital L. About what it is and what it should be and about how it should be given and received.

Matteo likes slow kisses. David can tell from how he holds Sara.

* * *

Matteo makes him think too much. At this point, it is getting philosophical. Why should you tidy a strangers house? Why should you clean up for your enemy? What makes someone your opposition in the first place? Is it the same thing that makes someone your equal? And if so, what about it changes from person to person?

If Matteo makes David feel too much, is it also possible he can make David feel numb? Why does learning about Matteo lead David to learn about himself? How can he learn more?

* * *

_Ey, I bought more weed._ David’s eyes blink at the harsh brightness of his phone screen. On the mattress beside him, Laura shifts and groans.

“Turn off the light,” she moans. His phone vibrates again.

_This is Matteo, btw._

David checks the time. He writes back that _It’s 2 in the morning._

Matteo, immediately: _I don’t know how to make brownies._

“David!” Laura barks. He sighs and sits up in his bed.

“I’m going. I’m going,” he says.

* * *

Matteo’s laugh is so easy and light and high. Or maybe he’s just high. David’s high. No, wait—no, yeah, David’s high.

“Why are these so good?” Matteo asks. “Why are you so good?” David smiles, lost in Matteo’s red eyes for a moment. And then he remembers what they’re talking about.

“Those are private,” David says. He reaches for his journal. “They’re all private, actually.”

“Yeah, well, actually, you’ve already shown me some. So.” Matteo grabs his hand and moves it away. David can feel every dip and crack and crevice he comes into contact with.

“I don’t wanna get high with you.”

Matteo blinks. “I mean, you can leave, then.”

“No,” David goes. And then, “Dick.” Matteo laughs. “I mean, I don’t wanna just get high with you. Let’s do something sober.”

“I think I’m too fucked for that,” Matteo says.

“Then tomorrow,” David proposes.

“Then tomorrow,” Matteo agrees.

* * *

“If you hate being alone then why do you live alone? Like, without your parents?”

“My dad doesn’t want to look after me. My mom is too sick to look after me. I’m too young to look after her.” It takes all the energy left in David's body for him to turn his head and watch Matteo as he says this. “Blah, blah, blah.”

“Blah, blah, blah,” David says. “Great story.”

“What about you. Why are you alone?”

“I’m not alone. I have my sister.”

“And Leonie,” Matteo goes.

“And Leonie.” David says, “And you’ve got Sara.” Matteo scoffs. “What was that?”

“I don’t think Sara and I are gonna last long,” Matteo says.

“Why not?” The question gets no answer. Somewhere between it leaving David’s lips and meeting Matteo’s ears, the words melt into a lullaby, and when one boy closes his eyes, the other has no choice but to do the same.

* * *

David learns that he is competitive. He is very competitive. He wants to beat Matteo at everything and, for the most part, he does.

* * *

**THINGS MATTEO FLORENZI SUCKS AT**

  * Biking
  * Climbing
  * Singing
  * Dancing
  * Actually, Anything Involving Music
  * Mario Kart
  * Cooking Anything Besides Pasta



Matteo insists on adding this last part.

David tapes this onto Matteo’s door. In response, Matteo makes:

 

**THINGS MATTEO FLORENZI CAN DO BETTER THAN DAVID SCHREIBNER**

  * Speak Italian
  * Cook Pasta
  * Smoke Weed
  * Take a Joke



 

David glares. “I can take a joke,” he says. Matteo raises an eyebrow. “Erase it.” Matteo raises both eyebrows. “Fine, whatever.” But he crosses it out when no one’s looking.

* * *

David likes being friends with someone who’s attractive. People stare at Matteo as if they can’t help it, as if he’s magnetizing them. Sara hangs off his arm. Sam bats her lashes at him over lunch.

It's even better that Matteo barely notices. It's better that when girls are smiling and flirting and nodding and laughing after his jokes, Matteo’s only checking to see if David thought it was funny as well.

Some part of it may be competitiveness, maybe even jealousy, but David hopes it is pure. He wishes he could just look at Matteo and think nothing and feel nothing. But it’s overwhelming: his smile and the brightness of his eyes and the huskiness of his voice after an hour of smoking. Overwhelming that all these girls exist and Matteo's only ever looking at him.

It’s not possessive. And if it must be, if Matteo must be David’s, then David will be Matteo’s as well. Equilibrium. Together they are autonomy and absolute, their hegemony spreading from David’s front door to the darkest corner of Matteo’s room. David and Matteo are DavidandMatteo. It feels right this way. It feels good. It feels obvious.

So, when Matteo says, “I broke up with Sara,” it’s not that David anticipates it, but that it seems like a necessary next step.

David says, without thinking much about it, “Good job.”

“Why good job?"

“I don’t know; you weren’t happy.” He shrugs.

“Yeah,” Matteo says. And then, “I’m starting to think girls aren’t my thing.” David freezes, which makes Matteo freeze. “I mean—”

“No, that’s good.” David knows he’s turning red. But he doesn’t want Matteo to think about why. So he just says it again: “That’s good.”

* * *

“We have to kill the Italian,” Leonie says with the command of a military general. It’s so violent and persuasive, David almost agrees without question.

Sara runs into his arms and wraps herself around his middle. He hesitantly pats her head.

“He dumped me,” she cries. _Oh, yeah,_ he thinks. He’d forgotten that on the walk over. Even when he tries to think back on it now, he can only remember _girls aren’t my thing._ Which implies boys _are_ his thing—unless he's asexual. Fuck. What if he's asexual? What if he doesn’t like boys either? Why didn’t he ask about that? “No reason why, either.”

“Did he tell you?” Leonie pulls Sara away and pushes her behind them with ease, as if her friend were a rag doll. Leonie gets in his face, her pretty eyes getting bigger and meaner and scarier than he’s ever seen them.

“Um,” David goes.

“Did he tell you why?”

“No.”

Sara cries, “But you’re, like, his best friend.” Leonie steps back now, regarding her boyfriend with a full-body scan. She’s doing it again: seeing everything every time. David stands perfectly still.

Leonie goes, “Well?”

David says, “Jonas is his best friend.”

Leonie and Sara ask, “What?”

He clears his throat. Again: “I thought Jonas was his best friend.” Leonie rolls her eyes.

“You can’t talk to him again,” she says. David laughs. “I’m not joking.”

“I won’t stop talking to him just because you’re mad at him.”

Leonie crosses her arms. “What happened to how you thought just two weeks ago? He helped Jonas cheat on me. He was mean to Sara. You said that!”

“I know, but—”

“But what?” Leonie asks, and she sounds angry, but he sees her eyes. Big, pretty eyes getting sadder and sadder like they can see inside of him, see right through him. He does not love Leonie, but he likes her very much. His first friend in Berlin. The first person besides Laura to make him laugh since he came out. She is very beautiful, both of face and of heart.

“But nothing.” David takes her hands. “I’m sorry.” Leonie sighs and her breath makes her hair float and fall around them like autumn leaves.

Sara barks, “What about _me?_ ” David and Leonie share a small smile.

“I’m sorry for you, too.”

They tend to her throughout the night, wiping her tears and force feeding her chocolate. The Netflix shows pick themselves, the automated selections continuing on through the night. Sara asks Why at 23:00 and then again at 23:38 and then she falls asleep. Leonie plays with Sara’s hair. David plays with Leonie.


	3. Infatuation to Love

Truly, everything stems from David's want—David's need, really—to be a good person. A good person is good to others and to their surroundings and to himself. That means he must be free, not only to make his own decisions, but to be himself. His mother had given him many questionable rules for how to be Good, and though she prepared him for a horrid life not worth living, she taught him well.

It is one thing to have control over yourself. It is a bad thing to attempt to control another. It is the worst thing to let someone control you.

A good person never lives for someone else. A good person is free. When a good person is trapped and held hostage in a body and a name and a house, he must seek freedom. It is an awful thing to reject yourself and to deny yourself freedom, to deny yourself goodness.

* * *

He wants to be a good person. He wants to be a good boyfriend.

* * *

Matteo won't stop texting him. David is sure it must be some kind of sign from some kind of higher being. A test of morale or of fate. The universe is asking if he'll do the right thing.

He's not sure what the right thing is. He also hates the idea of fate. It was not fated he have his life nor fated he'd move to Berlin in the cold with a month left of classes. Fate would not be cruel. And if it would be, then fuck fate anyways.

* * *

_I watched that movie._

_It's good._

An hour later: _I still have weed._

_Can you make me brownies?_

Thirty minutes later: _Cheese toasties?_

"Daviiiid," Laura moans. He hears her shift around her bed in the dark. "Is your brightness on 10,000?"

He locks his screen.

* * *

 _David,_ Matteo says. He says it like it's holy, like he's speaking in tongues. _DavidDavidDavid._ He goes breathless. He makes him breathless.

They fall to the floor and David kisses wherever he can reach—mouth and cheek and hair and fingertips. He moves the collar of Matteo's sweater (what is with these ugly ass sweaters?) and licks down his neck, over his throat, along his clavicle. And all the while: _DavidDavidDavid._

He can make Matteo whine; he's terrible. He can make Matteo yell; he's amazing. He can make Matteo beg _pleasepleaseplease_.

_DavidDavidDa-_

"DAVID!"

He springs awake. Laura waves his phone in front of his face. It's ringing. Not Matteo. A call from Leonie. David sighs and falls back into bed. Laura says, "You're loud."

His chest tightens. "I talk in my sleep?"

"No," she goes. He sighs. As she waltzes back to her bed: "No talking, more like moaning." David covers his face with his blanket. His sister hollers, "MATTEO, MATTEO, BABY!"

* * *

 _I_ s _it because of the Sara thing?_

David stares at his phone. The Sara Thing. The Sara Thing.

"David?" He looks up. Sara's there, fragile and flowery and pretty. She glides up to him from the ice rink. He leans against the railing to greet her. "Are you sure you don't want skates?"

"I'm fine. It's cold."

"Is that Matteo?" She's looking at his phone. "Is he asking about me?"

He says, "No, it's Laura." He thinks good people shouldn't lie. "I don't talk to Matteo anymore."

"You two were getting quite close," she says. He nods. "Maybe you could talk to him and ask him why."

"Why?"

"Why he dumped me." David hugs himself, trying to trap himself out of the cold. It doesn't work.

He says, "I don't think it'd be healthy to do that."

"So you think it's healthy I don't know?" She clings to the railing between them, her knuckles growing paler. David begins pulling off his mittens. "I'm dying." He hands her the gloves.

"You're not dying."

"I don't need gloves."

"You'll be fine."

"Then why offer me gloves?"

"You know I meant with Matteo."

Sara glares. "You'll give me your gloves and freeze but you won't talk to my ex-boyfriend for me? Just one simple question? Huh?" David glances toward the concession stand. Leonie is buying hot cocoa. Sara smiles. "We won't tell her. It'll be our secret."

* * *

Matteo smells like weed again. His whole apartment does. His roommates aren't home and his eyes are red and he's wearing one of his ugly sweaters. David hates those stupid sweaters. He wants to take it off of him. He wants to stop wanting that.

"I smoked all the weed. There's none left," Matteo says and he flops down on the couch. His baggy sweatpants sag low on his hips and David stares at the small exposed patch of his skin. Matteo has tiny, brown dots there. Freckles. Cute.

"I gathered."

Matteo says, without looking at him, "Are you here to cut me off?" David isn't sure if he's joking. "Officially?"

"What do you mean?"

"Because of Sara." Sara is so small and harmless. She's not enough to block anyone or anything. David himself once accidentally took her out with a dodge ball after a week of knowing her.

He decides that she cannot stop him. He doesn't know what she would be stopping in the first place. She's not his girlfriend; Leonie is. He has a girlfriend. He is a good person.

Matteo mutters something in a small voice. David pretends he hears it.

"She wants to know why you broke up with her."

"What'd you tell her?"

"I told her I don't know." Matteo mumbles something else. "What?"

"You do know, though," he says again. David shrugs.

"That's not her business."

"Is that what you came to say?" Matteo pulls at the edge of his sweater, stuffing the material between his fingers. David wants to hold his hand. He rolls his eyes at himself. _Focus._

"I wanted to see you," David says. "I missed you." Matteo's eyes flicker to meet his.

"I texted you."

"I want to be able to tell Leonie I don't text you." And then, "So I don't have to lie."

"Where does she think you are now?"

"Home." Matteo sits up on the couch now and stares at him. Just stares, long and hard. David fidgets. "I don't want to go home."

Matteo says, "Okay."

* * *

He should not think of Matteo when he's with Leonie. It isn't fair. It also isn't much of a choice. She won't stop talking about him.

"He thinks he can just do whatever he wants. Hurt whoever he wants." Leonie swings around her room, pacing. David sits on her bed and turns to watch her move back and forth. "You were right about him. You were. Oh, don't give me that look."

"What look?"

"That 'I told you so' look."

"This isn't my 'I told you so' look. This is my 'can we stop talking about Matteo' look." She stops moving around. She facepalms.

"I just hate seeing Sara like this. She really needs a distraction from home right now."

David says, without thinking, "That's not what he's for." And before she can respond, he says, "That's not what anyone's for. If anything, you should spend time with people who remind you of home. Or at least of what a home is supposed to feel like. And if Matteo didn't make her feel good—or feel anything—then why should he stay? Why should she want him to stay?" He sighs. "What about how he feels?"

"I won't sympathize with him." Leonie sits next to him on the bed. "He did it through text. It was so impersonal and cold." Leonie faces him. "I would never do that to you." She cups his rosy cheeks and brings him close. He smiles. She smiles. "I'd dump you like this."

"Exactly like this?"

"Mm-hmm."

He seriously asks, "What's stopping you?" He freezes up, but she doesn't take it seriously. Instead, she ruminates on it, thinking and thinking, her eyes rolling up to the ceiling and her tongue poking out the corner of her lips.

Finally, she goes, "And if he really thinks he can get away with this, he's got another thing coming."

"Oh!" David yells, and he kisses her to shut her up.

* * *

Matteo is too high to do anything fun, so they lounge around his room, chatting. He drapes himself across his bed, his red eyes staring out at nothing in particular. David plays with Linn's basket ball. He tosses it up and down and dribbles a bit.

Matteo goes, "You're good."

"How would you know? Do you play?" Matteo turns back to stare at nothing.

Matteo says, "I thought you were ignoring me because of the Sara thing."

"Well, I kind of was."

"The Sara thing," he goes again. "The boy thing." David drops the ball.

"The boy thing?"

"The gay thing." Matteo says, "I'm gay."

 _Oh, thank God._ David momentarily allows himself to believe in God and fate and the universe. David momentarily allows himself to think of all he hasn't allowed himself to consciously think about. Matteo's hands and lips and eyes. Matteo's laugh and voice and hiccups. How he rubs at his nose with his sleeve and moves slowly wherever he goes. Slow like how he kisses. Matteo's kisses. "Is that okay?"

David snaps out of it.

He asks, "Why wouldn't it be okay? Of course it's okay. It's more than okay."

"I don't know." Matteo looks up at the ceiling. "Every time I say it, you look at me like you want to pound me."

David is silent.

He is still. He will not move. Matteo says, "Like now." He slides himself up into a sitting position, as if he wants to Talk, as if he has Something to Say.

"Don't move," David says. Matteo frowns.

"Why?"

"Just don't."

David will not force Matteo to love him. He will not force love on anyone. He will ask and, if Matteo says yes, he will cheat on his girlfriend and kiss Matteo until the world stops spinning and until his legs give out. And even then, his bones will fracture and break into dust, and the two of them can mix together forever and forever amen.

He's never thought about anyone like this before. He's never thought like this before. David has always been the same. David has always known who he is. He is someone different when Matteo looks at him. And if they were to touch and kiss, David knows he would be remade over and over with each act, and he would have no choice but to touch and kiss Matteo again, if only to become reacquainted with himself.

* * *

David draws in the living-room at night, away from Laura so she can sleep. He traces bodies on an empty street. He sketches the touching of hands and lips and foreheads. At the bottom, he scrawls in horrible handwriting, _I cannot stop thinking about you._

* * *

A good person will not be controlled by others. He will not let pretty boys ruin his plans.

He will finish school.

He will date Leonie because she is fun and she is easy.

He will.

He will.

He will.

* * *

_Fuck fuck fuck._

* * *

Matteo opens his door and rubs his eyes. He goes, groggily, "David?"

"Can I kiss you?" He hates the sound of his voice. He hates being desperate. He hates needing someone. Matteo's not answering fast enough. Again: "Can I kiss you?"

"Okay."

"Thank you."

David grabs Matteo's face with both hands, pulls him close, and sees stars.

He thought this would be greedier. When he left home and jogged over here, he thought this would be quick and fast and messy.

He did not anticipate Matteo's lips to be soft. Why are they so soft? He's never seen this boy even look at a tube of chapstick. What kind of weed is he smoking? What kind of rolling paper makes lips feel like this, taste like this? Matteo is superhuman.

Matteo is very gentle. At a certain point, David's knees wobble and he honestly thinks he'll pass out. Matteo reaches out to steady him. He turns his head to the side and waits for David to come back to him. David does, over and over again.

* * *

_Did you talk to Matteo?_

_Helllo?_

_David?_

* * *

_My place tonight?_

_My parents aren't home_

_David..._

* * *

_Sara told me what you did_

_Well, what did he say???_

_omg David you better be dead in a ditch somewhere_

* * *

"I am the worst person alive," David concludes. He drops his phone to the floor. Matteo turns to him in bed and flicks him off.

"Yeah," he says. "Fuck you."

* * *

"We can't stay here forever."

Matteo shakes his head. "We need supplies. Like food."

Matteo moves in closer, placing his full upperbody on David's chest. "And fresh air."

He takes David's hand and puts it in his hair. He kisses David's mouth and bites David's bottom lip. David stops talking.

* * *

David only answers the door because they ordered pizza.

It is not pizza.

He stares at his girlfriend. She stares at him. They say nothing.

Matteo asks from the living-room if David has "enough for a tip?" The words break Leonie out of her trance.

She says, "FUCKING MEN!" She throws up her hands. "FUCK. MEN." She says, passionately: "Fuck!" She storms down the staircase.

David is glued to his spot.

Behind him, he hears Matteo say, "Um."

Leonie bounds back up the stairs. "Will you follow me?" she asks.

"Uh," he says. She goes to him. Cups his face in both her hands.

"Nothing is stopping me," she says. "Do you want to be with me?" He does. Not in the way she's meaning it now, though. "It doesn't matter. It's done." To Matteo: "Don't ask my brother for more weed."

* * *

**Things You Like About Matteo**

David says, "Please."

Matteo says, "You led me on. It's compensation."

David sighs.

 **Things ~~You~~ I Like About Matteo** 

  * He is Good



* * *

 

"I already broke up with you."

David goes, "I want to say sorry."

"You're not forgiven."

David goes, "I haven't _said_ it yet."

"Then say it." Leonie crosses her arms.

"I'm s-"

She slams the door.

When he tells Matteo about this, he responds, simply, "Sara says she hopes we're happy together."

"No. Did she?" And Matteo shows him the text.

* * *

"You only put one thing on the list."

"I only need one thing."

Matteo hums, then slowly begins to turn through the other pages of the journal. David reaches to snatch it away. They fight over it.

He does not love Matteo.

Not yet.

He will, though. He can tell that he will very soon.

They fall into bed. The journal hits the floor, forgotten. Matteo is in his arms and he is good.

David kisses Matteo slow, steady, and sweet. Matteo likes it.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading!


End file.
